Governor briefs President on Bengal situation; flags ‘anarchy’ in state before media

The meeting comes two days after BJP MP Khagen Murmu and the party’s Siliguri MLA Sankar Ghosh were attacked by a mob during their visit to the flood and landslide-hit Dooars region in the northern part of West Bengal.

Bose said “all that needed to be done to protect” elected representatives would be done in a transparent manner. “These are issues which have to be decided by the competent authorities after much thought. Constitutional options are there, legal options are there, the court is there, Supreme Court judgments are there…based on all these things, a decision has to be taken…I believe, we have a mature democracy where appropriate decisions will be taken in an appropriate manner,” he said.

Bose accused the West Bengal Police of “strangling” what they were supposed to protect (law and order). “What we saw on the streets of Bengal by way of natural calamities and man-made atrocities is something which is shocking…the police are supposed to protect the law and order in the state – but it is like Shakespeare’s Othello. Desdemona thought Othello is the protector. But he strangled her,” he told news agencies.

“This kind of anarchy… near anarchy cannot continue even in isolated pockets of Bengal…Under the Constitution of India, right to life is a fundamental right, but people are scared… of goondas; there is a kind of goondaraj in many places in Bengal,” he said.

“That is something which I have been observing for the last three years. This situation cannot go on…strict action is to be taken. Bengal has to certainly come back to normalcy…people are living in fear,” he said.